'We were on the sauce,' James Ashby says of One Nation's gun lobby tape – video

Senior One Nation figures James Ashby and Steve Dickson claim they had been “on the sauce” drinking scotch for “three or four hours” when discussing seeking a $20m donation from the National Rifle Association to the far-right Australian party.

Ashby and Dickson faced the media on Tuesday after an al-Jazeera investigation revealed the two men had sought millions in donations from the NRA during a trip to the US last year, in a bid to seize the balance of power and weaken Australia’s gun laws.

Dickson said the party’s leader, Pauline Hanson, was “quite ill” and unable to appear publicly.

Instead, Dickson and Ashby faced questions about their interactions with a journalist, Rodger Muller, who used a hidden camera and posed as a grassroots gun campaigner to expose the party’s extraordinary efforts to secure funding in Washington DC in September.

Dickson was at times impassioned in defence of their actions, and at others appeared flustered. He apologised several times for sweating and, unsolicited, talked about visiting strip clubs in his youth.

“This … may be the last thing I ever say in politics, I don’t know yet. I don’t know if I want to keep doing this because I couldn’t believe that a person like me could be sucked in to the extent that I’ve been sucked in,” Dickson said.

“This is the stuff you see in James Bond magazines. I would never expect you would see this for real in the real world.”

Dickson and Ashby gave a detailed account of their interactions with Muller. They said the journalist first approached Ashby in New South Wales in about 2017. Muller visited Dickson – who Ashby said was the party’s “gun person” – at his Sunshine Coast home soon afterwards.

Dickson said Muller had initially said he wanted to keep Australia’s strict gun laws, but that his position changed soon afterwards. The two men then travelled to the US, a trip they claimed was to learn about campaigning tactics, not to solicit donations from the NRA.

“We didn’t get any money from any US lobby groups at all, not a cent,” Dickson said.

The investigation recorded a meeting between the One Nation officials and representatives from Koch Industries, which funds various conservative causes in the US.

Accusing al-Jazeera of being “an agent” of the Qatari government, Ashby and Dickson said their remarks had been taken out of context and called for the media agency to release all the taped footage from the trip.

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“These conversations with the NRA were to look at nothing more than their techniques,” Ashby said.

“This was not about sourcing money from the NRA. This was about sourcing technology, sourcing an understanding of how they operate, but never was it about seeking $20 million from the NRA.

“And the conversations that have been recorded where is a talk of $10 million to $20 million, I will be the first to admit, we’d arrived in America, we got on the sauce, we’d had a few drinks and that’s where those discussions took place, not with any potential donors, no one but Rodger Muller, Steve Dickson and myself.”

Dickson apologised for “some of the things” he was recorded saying.

“I’m going to apologise to the people of Australia for some of the things that Rodger Muller has taped me saying when we were having a few drinks at the bar at our local hotel,” he said.

“I don’t talk like that publicly. We were three men talking together and having scotches for about three or four hours. That is the truth of the matter.”

Ashby called for al-Jazeera to release the full and unedited recordings of their conversations, and said One Nation would alter Australia’s gun laws.

When challenged by an ABC reporter about the contradiction between his comments about wanting to maintain the status quo, and recorded comments that appear to support a watering down of Australian gun laws, Ashby snapped back.

“You’re best buddies with al-Jazeera, ABC, why not get the full statement out on the record so people can make an informed decision. You are not putting forward the facts. Put forward the full facts. That’s what’s been required. You are a very rude man who won’t listen to the facts.”